Fifty years and over of Akron and Summit County : embellished by nearly six hundred engravings--portraits of pioneer settlers, prominent citizens, business, official and professional--ancient and modern views, etc.; nine-tenth's of a century of solid local history--pioneer incidents, interesting events--industrial, commercial, financial and educational progress, biographies, etc., Part 85

Author: Lane, Samuel A. (Samuel Alanson), 1815-1905
Publication date: 1892
Publisher: Akron, Ohio : Beacon Job Department
Number of Pages: 1228

USA > Ohio > Summit County > Akron > Fifty years and over of Akron and Summit County : embellished by nearly six hundred engravings--portraits of pioneer settlers, prominent citizens, business, official and professional--ancient and modern views, etc.; nine-tenth's of a century of solid local history--pioneer incidents, interesting events--industrial, commercial, financial and educational progress, biographies, etc. > Part 85

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"GIVING HIMSELF UP."-On reaching Peninsula, Washburn first went to the store of Justice Merrill Boody, who, at the moment, was in the midst of a business transaction with a gentle- man from Cleveland, and inquired as to whether any money had been paid in on a small judgment in his favor against his mother- in-law. On receiving a negative answer, Washburn said that he believed he would give himself up. Having been a good deal annoyed about the judgment in question, and feeling a little provoked at the interruption to his business transaction with the Cleveland gentleman, and not having the remotest idea of what he wanted to "give himself up" for, Justice Boody curtly replied, "I don't want you-I wouldn't give two cents for you!"

Thereupon Washburn went to the office of Dr. Sumner Pixley and on meeting the doctor exclaimed: "Here's another McFar- land affair!" In reply to the doctor's question as to what he meant, Washburn told him what he had done, and why and how he did it, and asked the doctor to advise him what to do. The doc- tor advised him to go and give himself up to the authorities. Washburn replied that he had already been to 'Squire Boody, but that Boody said that he did not want him, that he wouldn't give two cents for him, etc. The doctor then advised him to go back home and attend to his own business.

PROMPT ACTION BY MAYOR MCNEIL .- Washburn took the doc- tor's advice, went home, ate his supper and went to bed, night setting in about the time he left the village for his home. Doctor Pixley spread the news of the homicide, as detailed to him by the perpetrator thereof. In the meantime, too, Johnson had summoned the neighbors, a number of whom had assembled about the scene of the bloody tragedy, though, under the prevailing notion that a dead body must not be removed from the place where found, until the coroner has first viewed it, it was left in the woods all night. Mr. Henry Crissick filed an affidavit before Mayor William McNeil, of Peninsula, who placed his warrant in the hands.of Constable Otis W. Fitts, for the murderer's arrest. Sum- moning a posse, the constable started for the scene of the murder, arriving at the house of Washburn about midnight. He offered no resistance, but begged the constable to allow him to remain with his family until morning, when he would report at any place that officer might name, which, had his request been granted, he undoubtedly would have done.

689

THE PRISONER ON TRIAL.

A LAST LOOK AT HIS VICTIM .- But that indulgence Constable Fitts could not grant, and he accordingly dressed himself, and was soon ready to start. Going with the officer and others to where the' body of his victim lay, by the light of a lantern, carried by one of the party, he gazed for the last time, as he supposed, upon the earthly remains of his former friend and comrade in arms, slain by his own hand, without any audible expression of regret, or visible emotion, the party reaching Peninsula about daylight on Sunday morning.

POST-MORTEM EXAMINATION .- Though the cause of the death of Charles Peoples was abundantly apparent, from the repeated declarations of Washburn, Mayor McNeil deemed it necessary to hold a coroner's inquest over the remains. The body, therefore, was removed, on Sunday morning, to the town house in Penin- sula, where, during the day, an autopsy was made by Drs. Sumner Pixley and Elwyn Humphrey, to enable them to intelligently tes- tify before the mayor, on the preliminary examination of the prisoner, in regard to the nature and extent of the wounds, which had been inflicted upon the deceased; Washburn inquiring after- wards, of Dr. Humphrey, whether what he had suffered, from the conduct of Peoples, would not be considered sufficient to drive him insane?

PRELIMINARY HEARING, INDICTMENT, ETC.

In mayor's court, on Monday morning, July 18, a preliminary examination was held before Mayor McNeil, who, after the exam- ination of a large number of witnesses, held the accused, without bail, to answer to the charge of willful and premeditated murder, and on the same day he was duly committed to jail by Constable Fitts. At the October term, 1870, of the Court of Common Pleas for Summit county, Prosecuting Attorney, Jacob A. Kohler, Esq., laid Mayor McNeil's transcript before the grand jury, which returned a "True Bill," containing some five or six counts, charging the prisoner with the premeditated and malicious murder of Charles Peoples.

To this indictment, on its being reåd to him, in open court, by Prosecutor Kohler, the defendant entered a plea of not guilty, and being destitute of means to employ counsel, General Alvin C. Voris and Hon. Henry Mckinney were assigned to defend him on the trial, which was set for Monday, November 7, 1870, Governor Sidney Edgerton, being assigned to assist in the prosecution.

THE FINAL HEARING .- At the time designated, Judge Wash- ington W. Boynton presiding, the prisoner was put upon his final trial. The 36 jurors originally summoned having been exhausted without securing a full panel, several other venires were issued, and three full days were consumed, and about 90 persons exam- ined as to their qualifications, before twelve jurors satisfactory to both the State and defendant were secured, the panel finally agreed upon being as follows: Rees J. Thomas, Loten Hartle, Nathan Swinehart, Edwin R. Newell, Melchiah Sherbondy, Vincent G. Harris, Thomas Wright, Elias Rothrock, Isaac Winters, Sylvester Van Hyning, Alpheus Myers, William T. Bell.

THE PLEA OF INSANITY .- The case was opened with a clear and concise statement, by Prosecuting Attorney Kohler, giving the main facts pertaining to the homicide, and the proofs which

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would be offered by the State, General Voris making a compre- hensive statement in behalf of the accused, from which, as show- ing the theory of the defense, we quote as follows:

"The subject of this awful visitation was born in this county, in 1845, and has always lived in this vicinity, except the four years of the late war, when he, from the 16th to the 20th years of his age, served as a soldier-three years in the regular army and one year . in a volunteer regiment. We shall prove that in October, 1865, he was married to the lady sitting here, who is, unfortunately, but innocently, the cause of the tragic death of Charles Peoples; that two children, one little girl of four and another of two years of age, are the result of their union; that up to the time of his mar- riage, the accused had filled the full measure of obligations to the laws and to community, exhibiting nothing in his conduct of way- wardness more than usual in the history of American boys."

After commenting at length on the conduct of Peoples, and the causes leading to the fatal event, General Voris concluded as fol- lows: "We expect to show that the seeds of insanity were planted in his system by the laws that gave him existence, and from maternal and paternal ancestors; that in the Summer of 1863, while struggling on the fated field of Chickamauga, he had a sun-stroke from which he never fully recovered; that he was laboring under delusions at the time of the alleged homicide; that whatever he may have done on the 16th day of July last, and however atrocious his acts may appear to have been, they were the offspring or product of an insane mind, overpowered by the overwhelming miseries that fiercely took possession of this unfortunate man."

EXAMINATION OF WITNESSES .- Witnesses in chief, on behalf of the State, were introduced as follows: Daniel Peck, Mrs. Newell Stocker, Miss Dustine Stocker, John H. Johnson, Lorenzo Seeley, Dr. Sumner Pixley, Merill Boody, John Cole, Otis W. Fitts, Dr. Elwyn Humphrey and Wallace Humphrey, a day and a-half being occupied in their examination.

The witnesses for the defense were: Merrill Boody, Dr. Sumn- ner Pixley, Dr. William Bowen, J. B. Lambert, Harmon Graves, E. S. Washburn (father of the prisoner), Mrs. Elizabeth Washburn (mother of accused), Ellen Elizabeth Washburn (wife of the accused, but who, being objected to by the State, was ruled out), Vendruth D. Washburn (the defendant), Dr. A. E. Ewing, Dr. Will- iam Bowen, about the same time being consumed in the examii- nation in chief and cross-examination as for the State.

TESTIMONY IN REBUTTAL .- Though interposing the plea of justifiable homicide, the entire effort of the defense was to establish their theory of the mental unsoundness of their client, and his lack of responsibility for the act which he had perpetrated. In rebuttal, to controvert the insanity hypothesis, witnesses were introduced as follows: James W. Lockert, George Greenleese, S. M. Campbell, John Cole, Dr. W. C. Jacobs, Sidney P. Conger, Alexander Snow, Holland Snow, Jane Kelly (sister of the defen- dant's wife), Dr. George P. Ashmun, Dr. Thomas McEbright, Charles Lemoin, Warren S. Wicks, John Chapman, William Chap- man, Dr. C. F. H. Biggs, James Black, Peter Baumgardner, James Brittain, A. J. Sovacool, V. C. Carpenter, M. B. Roach, E. D. Han- cock, Henry S. Barnhart, Levi Newell, Patrick Agnew, Charles Reed, Thomas Smith and J. C. Templeton.

691

ARGUMENTS OF COUNSEL-CHARGE, ETC.

ARGUMENTS OF COUNSEL .- Testimony closed on Monday even- ing, the seventh day of the trial. On Tuesday morning, Governor Edgerton addressed the jury, on behalf of the State, for about two hours in a full and candid review of the circumstances attending the homicide, and of the evidence tending to show that the crime was not only deliberately planned, but inexorably carried out; giving especial emphasis to the increasing tendency and the imminent danger of interposing the plea of insanity as an excuse for the perpetration of the most flagrant and ruthless crimes.

Hon. Henry Mckinney followed in a very lucid analysis of the testimony bearing upon the mental derangement of the accused, and of the effect that the real or supposed invasion of his marital rights, would be likely to have upon a sensitive mind, especially a mind predisposed to insanity by hereditary taint.

General Voris followed his colleague, on the defense, by a full and clear presentation of authorities on the subject of insanity and its relation to crime, and in an earnest, eloquent and solemn appeal to the jury for the acquittal of his unfortunate, rather than criminal, client.

Prosecuting Attorney Kohler, closing on behalf of the State, gave a brief but perspicuous review of the laws governing the trials for homicide, the utter fallacy of the theory of insanity, either hereditary or impulsive, as applicable to the case on trial, because of the manifest planning and deliberation-the pro- curing of the ammunition and the careful cleaning and loading of the revolver, nearly a week in advance; the sending away of his children; the pursuit of his wounded victim when he was fleeing from his murderous fury, and the ruthless sending of a bullet through his brain while already in the agonies of death; and of his preconceived line of defense, by saying to one doctor, "there is another McFarland affair," and inquiring of another, while return- ing from holding an autopsy upon his victim, whether the treat- ment he had received at the hands of the man he had slain would be considered enough to drive him insane, etc., all pointing to a most deliberate and malicious murder; closing with a most powerful appeal to the jury to do full and impartial justice between the accused and the State, to the end that her laws should be vindicated and her citizens protected in their persons and their lives.

JUDGE BOYNTON'S CHARGE .- Judge Boynton occupied about an hour in delivering his charge to the jury, carefully defining the several degrees of homicide, and the law applicable thereto, and especially when hereditary insanity or uncontrollable impulse is interposed as a defense, closing as follows:

"In view of what was said to you by one of the counsel for the defense, I deem it my duty to say that public sentiment is not the law of the land. It may be made so by legislation, but until so made it should be entirely disregarded in courts of justice. The personal safety of the victim-the common welfare of the com- munity, and the social order of the State, alike demand that the law, as it is, should be strictly enforced. The result to be reached by you should be controlled by, and arise from, an honest, careful and dispassionate consideration of the evidence, and by that only. That the accused took the life of Charles Peoples is conceded. If he was insane when he fired the fatal shot, as I have before said

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to you, you should acquit him. If not, and you are clearly satis- fied of his guilt, it is your duty, equally solemn and binding, to so declare by your verdict."

THE VERDICT, SENTENCE, ETC .- Under the charge of Judge Boynton, after a few hours' deliberation, the jury returned their verdict as follows: "We, the jury, impaneled and sworn to well and truly try, and true deliverance make between the State of Ohio and the prisoner at the bar, Vendruth D. Washburn, do find him guilty of murder in the second degree. Edwin R. Newell, foreman."

Counsel for the defense having achieved the main object of their efforts, in reducing the verdict from the first to the second degree, thus averting the death penalty from their client, inter- posed no motion for a new trial, or arrest of judgment, by proceed- ings in error, and on Monday, November 21, 1870, the prisoner was brought into court for sentence. On being asked the usual ques- tion by Judge Boynton as to whether he had anything to say why the sentence of the law should not be pronounced against him in accordance with the verdict, the prisoner passed up to the judge a slip of paper, on which was written a request for a private inter- view with the judge. On reading it Judge Boynton said that he could not grant the request, but that the prisoner, by himself or his counsel, could make any statement he desired, whereupon Washburn then said:

"I claim that justice has not been done ine. I don't know much about law, for I never read niuch, but I know that any man would do just as I did under the same circumstances. There was enough reason for my doing as I did. I have served my country several years, but I don't know as the lives I have saved, and the service I have done the government, and the sufferings I have gone through, will make any difference with what will be done witlı me in this case. When I shot it was under an impulse that I could not resist, and I don't think that I ought to be held responsible, for I couldn't help it. I think I ought to have a new trial. This would be right and fair, for the judge and jury that tried me would have done just as I did. It is unjust to punish me for what I did."

Judge Boynton, continuing said: "However brave you may have been in defense of the government furnishes no reason to treat lightly the crime of which you stand convicted. The man who shoots another must suffer the penalty the law has affixed to the crime. From the evidence offered in the case, it seems that you were bent on killing Peoples. You got him into your house, away from all help, closed the door, took down the pistol from where it was hanging, and, as your victim was hitching along the lounge towards the door, in the vain hope of escaping, you delib- erately shot him, and followed him, shooting again and again. In passing sentence upon you, the court has no discretion. The statute prescribes the punishment for murder in the second degree, of which crime the jury have found you guilty, which punishment is imprisonment in the State's prison for the term of your natural life. It is, therefore, the judgment of this court that you be taken hence to the jail of the county, and thence, within thirty days, to the penitentiary, there to be confined during your natural life. It is no part of the sentence of this court that you be put into solitary confinement."

693

IN PRISON-DIVORCE, ETC.

CONDUCT OF THE PRISONER .- The bearing of the prisoner in jail had been generally pacific and amiable up to the finding of the verdict of the jury and the certainty that a new trial would not be granted. He then became somewhat ill-natured, and on going from the jail to the court house to receive his sentence, stoutly resisted Sheriff Curtiss and his deputy in their attempt to lock arms with him. He also became a good deal agitated during the delivery of the sentence, by Judge Boynton, but quietly accom- panied the officers back to jail.

IN THE PENITENTIARY .- From this time on, while awaiting transportation to Columbus, the prisoner was somewhat morose and irritable, and on starting with him, on November 28, 1870, the sheriff anticipated considerable trouble on the way, but was happily disappointed, the prisoner, having evidently concluded to submit to the inevitable with the best grace possible, being per- fectly quiet and amiable throughout the entire journey. . The total cost of the trial (exclusive of transportation fees), paid by the state treasurer to Sheriff Curtiss, was $734.05.

HIS PRISON DEPORTMENT .- For twenty-one years has Vendruth Washburn been separated from the world by the gloomy walls of his prison-house, and though he is reported by the prison officers to have a clean record as to deportment and conformity to prison rules, he is very restive under his protracted confinement, as is evidenced by the earnest appeals that he has from time to tinie made to his counsel, and others, to intervene in his behalf in an effort to secure a pardon, still claiming that, admitting his sanity at the commission of the act for which he was convicted, he has been sufficiently punished for visiting summary vengeance upon the invader of his domestic rights and marital sanctities.

PETITION FOR DIVORCE -- CURIOUS ANSWER .- The wife, Ellen Elizabeth Washburn, remained true to her original marital rela- tions for nearly four years, when, on the 7th day of October, 1874, through her attorney, William McNeil, Esq., she filed her petition in the court of Common Pleas, setting forth that ever since her marriage to the said Vendruth D. Washburn, on the 5th day of October, 1865, she had conducted herself toward him as a "faithful and obedient wife;" and, after reciting the fact of his conviction, sentence and incarceration in the penitentiary, asking that she might be divorced, with custody of children, etc.

A copy of this petition, accompanied by the usual summons, was duly served upon Washburn in the penitentiary, by the sheriff of Franklin county. Washburn at once returned the copy of the petition to County Clerk George W. Weeks, with the following request endorsed thereon:

STATE PRISON, COLUMBUS, Ohio, ¿ October 27, 1874. 5

GEO. W. WEEKS, ESQ .- SIR: I write a few lines which I request you to read to the court in the presence of the plaintiff, Ellen E. Washburn :

I, V. D. Waslıburn, defendant, ask that the plaintiff above named with- draw her petition for divorce. First, because she cannot obtain the divorce without committing the crime of perjury; she cannot truthfully affirm that she has been a true and a faithful and obedient wife of Defendant V. D. Washburn. Second, for her to obtain a divorce under such circumstances as exist in this case, and to marry again is for her to live in adultery. Third, if she persists in pressing the suit for divorce, it may compel me to reveal that which will be seriously to her disadvantage; it may bring her to the same humiliating position in which I am now placed. Fourth, I still have

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AKRON AND SUMMIT COUNTY.

so great a degree of regard for the mother of my children as to desire her best good, and to desire that she commit no further crime. Fifth, I do therefore send her this solemn warning-warning her to turn from sin and from crime, and to escape temporal and eternal punishment before it is ever- lastingly too late * * before she drags herself and her own flesh and blood down to the world of eternal woe. I have warned you, my once loved wife. Beware! BEWARE! BEWARE!

V. D. WASHBURN.

DECREE OF DIVORCE GRANTED .- Yet, notwithstanding this solemn warning, the petition was not withdrawn, and the decree- of divorce was duly granted, with the custody of the children, then eight and six years old, respectively, confirmed to the mother. Mrs. Washburn was subsequently married to Mr. James Hall, of Boston township, with whom she is still living. The two daugh- ters, now grown to womanhood, with commendable perseverance, in the face of poverty and the odium inseparable from the wrong- doing and misfortunes of the father, have secured for themselves a first-class education, with a view of teaching, and are both highly respected by all who know them.

. .

CHAPTER XXXII.

COPLEY IN EMBRYO-TOPOGRAPHY-THE BIG SWAMP-A GAMY LOCALITY- DANGER AND DEATH THERE, TOO-EFFORTS AT RECLAMATION-EARLY SETTLEMENT ORGANIZATION, ETC .- GROWTH, POPULATION, ETC .- BUSINESS STATUS "SPIRIT" MANIFESTATIONS-PIONEER TEMPERANCE SOCIETY- EDUCATION AND RELIGION - MILITARY RECORD) - COPLEY IN PUBLIC OFFICE-HER NEW RAILROAD-INSANE HOMICIDE, ETC.

THE STARTING POINT.

PREVIOUS to the erection of Summit county, in 1840, Copley was part and parcel of Medina county, which, though desig- nated as a separate county, was legally associated with Portage county until its own distinct organization, in 1818. Copley was originally a part of what was designated as Wolf Creek township, embracing the present townships of Copley, Norton, Wadsworth, Sharon, Guilford, and Montville. In the original survey, Copley was officially known as "Township 2, Range 12, of the Western Reserve," and is bounded on the north by Bath, east by Portage, south by Norton and west by Sharon.

TOPOGRAPHICAL .-- Though not bordered upon, or traversed by, any considerable streams of water, like some of the townships both north and south of it, quite a large proportion of the township originally was, and in fact still is, quite wet, Pigeon Creek, Chocolog Creek and Wolf Creek traversing nearly its entire length and breadth, from the north and west, culminating in a succession of ponds and marshes, pretty generally known as Copley swamp, but embracing about equal proportions of Copley, Portage and Norton townships.

Upon the confines of this swamp, on the west side, are three quite extensive bodies of water, designated, respectively, Chocolog Pond, White Pond and Black Pond, which in the past have afforded fine sporting grounds for the hunters and fishermen of the neigh- borhood, White Pond, in later years, furnishing large quantities of the very purest ice for the Akron market.

THERE WAS SPORT IN THOSE DAYS .- Besides the several vari- eties of fish and small game formerly abounding in and about the ponds in question, the swamp, every Autumn, for many years, swarmed with myriads of pigeons, of which thousands upon thou- sands were captured and slaughtered annually by the surrounding inhabitants. At an early day, also, larger game-wolves, bears, deer, wild-turkeys, etc.,-was abundant, a circular hunt occurring in December, 1821, in which some 200 persons participated, sur- rounding Copley swamp, and at a given signal marching towards the center. The result of the day's work, according to the recol- lection of the late Julius A. Sumner, was the killing of 75 deer, four bears and two wolves, and, according to the recollection of the late Avery Spicer, (whose father, Major Miner Spicer, was one of the chief managers of the hunt), 100 deer, 18 bears and two wolves, besides a great variety of smaller game.

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AKRON AND SUMMIT COUNTY.

DR. BYRON CHAPMAN,-son of Ashbel and Polly (Lane) Chap- man, was born near Skeneatteles, N. Y., January 8, 1822; at the age of 13, in 1835, came with parents to Ohio, set- tling in Copley; raised on farin with common school education; at 22, commenced the study of medicine with his brother Willian, then prac- ticing in Copley, attending lectures two terms in Cleveland Medical Col- lege, from which he was graduated in March, 1847. Dr. William Chapman dying, soon after his graduation, he took charge of his brother's patients and has been in constant and suc- cessful practice in Copley and vicin- ity ever since. December 23, 1847, he was married to Miss Matilda A. Dils, of New Hudson, Oakland county, Michigan, a native of Cayuga county, New York, who has borne him two children-Willis D., whose por- trait and biography will be found elsewhere, and Fanny P., widow of the late Albert E. Heistand, now liv- ing with her father in Copley. Though an ardent Republican, Dr. Chapman has never sought or held office, excepting those of treasurer of his township and of postmaster, but has ever been active in promot- ing the educational and moral inter-

EHEDIAT FCOCHI.

DR. BYRON CHAPMAN.

ests of the county, state and nation, being especially efficient in supply- ing the government with the sinews of war, during the great slaveholder's rebellion.

For several years after the writer came here, (1835), each recurring Winter would bring to the Akron market a liberal sup- ply of venison and wild turkey from the Copley swamp, and less than thirty years ago a fine deer was driven from the swamp, and after circling around toward New Portage, and again north- ward toward Akron, was finally brought to bay and killed upon what was then designated as the "Island," between Manning's Pond and Summit Lake, but by whom is not now remembered; an occasional turkey having been gathered in in still later years.

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Author: Lane, Samuel A. (Samuel Alanson), 1815-1905 Publication date: 1892 Publisher: Akron, Ohio : Beacon Job Department Number of Pages: 1228

Author: Lane, Samuel A. (Samuel Alanson), 1815-1905
Publication date: 1892
Publisher: Akron, Ohio : Beacon Job Department
Number of Pages: 1228